Critical Making Project #3: 'Arm's Length'

Based upon the third project criteria, our group examines the question- how can we design a wearable sensemaking device which shows how different nationalities perceive interpersonal space, 'the comfort zone', and indicates when that space has been transgressed?

For our first step, our group researched the definition of interpersonal space from the Oxford Dictionary of Geography, and found the following:

The linear distance separating one individual from others—the average distance by which one person separates herself or himself from the next person. Not surprisingly, the distance is least between couples, followed by family and friends, and greatest between strangers. It has also been observed that the extent of interpersonal space varies culturally, and that Anglo-Saxons tend to be more distant from their fellows than, say, Latins.

Then we researched the statistics for interpersonal space and found the following definition from neuropsychology, which describes personal space in terms of kinds of 'near-ness' to the body:

MaxSonar

1. Extrapersonal Space: The space that occurs outside the reach of an individual.
2. Peripersonal Space: The space within reach of any limb of an individual. Thus to be 'within-arm's length' is to be within one's peripersonal space.
3. Pericutaneous Space: The space just outside our bodies but which might be near to touching it. Visual-tactile perceptive fields overlap in processing this space so that, for example, an individual might see a feather as not touching their skin but still feel the inklings of being tickled when it hovers just above their hand.
4. Personal distance, or interpersonal space, is what anthropologists and sociologists might define as the distance consistently separating members of non-contact species.
5. But people, unlike animals, determine personal distance culturally, not genetically, and so acceptable distance varies widely from country to country.

Upon further research of intercultural definitions of space, we incorporated data from the Cultural Crossings web site, which cited the distance of peripersonal space according to nationality with Brazil at 30 cm, Canada at 60-90 cm, and India at 90 cm. We used this data to measure the length of three LEDs attached to the sleeve of an arm in ascending order of distance to indicate peripersonal space from Brazil, Canada, and India as a direct mapping of arm's length in relation to interpersonal distance.

To actuate these LEDs according to distance, we used a MaxSonar®-EZ1™ High Performance Sonar Range Finder to activate the LEDs when someone approached the subject wearing the sleeve.

Flags were placed on the sleeve to denote nationality, with their size designed to be proportionate according to peripersonal distance data, and LEDs were attached above these flags with colours coordinated to that of the flags, to be actuated by the approach of a stranger through motion input to the Sonar Range Finder.

As the psychological definition of interpersonal space 'creates and defines the social dynamics of our interactions with others', the sensemaking apparatus of our wearable computing project demonstrates through LED feedback a subject's unease and discomfort according to cultural norms.

Research:

1. http://www.answers.com/topic/interpersonal-space
2. http://dictionary.sensagent.com/personal+space/en-en/
3. http://www.shockmd.com/2009/03/27/the-neuroscience-of-interpersonal-space/
4. http://www.maxbotix.com/MaxSonar-EZ1__FAQ.html